


For a Lifetime

by Val Mora (valmora)



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Finland tops and everybody knows it, Fluff, M/M, don't even talk to me about the dietary habits here, the little wolf and the three fennic brothers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-01
Updated: 2010-09-01
Packaged: 2017-11-28 02:23:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/669149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/valmora/pseuds/Val%20Mora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A hungry wolf watches Finland and his brothers in their little home in the forest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	For a Lifetime

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted [here](http://hetalia-kink.livejournal.com/10456.html?thread=14505688#t14505688) to fill [this request](http://hetalia-kink.livejournal.com/3274.html?thread=4443594#t4443594) and not kindexed yet.

The boy’s cloak was woad-blue, the shade of sky, and he did not blend into the forest. Every day he walked from his cabin, where he lived with his two brothers, into the forest where he would fish all day before taking his catch back to the house and cooking it.

Berwald liked fish, but he was no good at catching them because his paws were too clumsy, so when he had first seen the boy use fishing-pole nets he had been captivated.

And then he’d seen how pretty the boy was, with eyes the color of flax-flowers, and singing so lovely-like to himself, and Berwald had crept away, knowing the red flush in his cheeks would show up in the green-and-brown forest, give him away to the other wolf-boys.

He didn’t want anyone to hurt the boy in the woad-blue cloak.

 

 

The boy didn’t come the next day, but Berwald saw the boy’s brother, who wore a red-blue-green patterned cloak, and who grew the sunflowers out by the house. Berwald waited all day, staying hidden in the forest but watching the house, only leaving to find some berries and mushrooms deeper in the woods.

When he came back the boy was picking berries from the bushes in the house’s garden, and Berwald watched him. He opened his mouth to howl, but thought that would just scare him off, and then the boy’s other brother, who was a powerful wizard, would kill Berwald and use his skin for a coat.

After picking berries, the boy chopped wood for the house’s fire, but Berwald didn’t like axes so he went back to the forest and thought about the boy, and how much Berwald wanted to talk to him but every time he thought about it all he wanted to do was slink back to his den and curl up in the warm spot by the wall.

On his way back to his den he saw a large bunch of his favorite mushrooms, but just as he was about to eat them up for dinner he thought, _If I give them to the boy, will he…?_ He wasn’t sure what the boy would do, or even what he wanted the boy to do.

So he went back to his den, where he had some scraps of cloth that he’d used to make a bed, and took one of the bigger ones – a little bigger than his paw – out to the mushroom patch. There, he picked most of the mushrooms, ate a few, and filled the cloth with mushrooms.

He laid it in front of the boy’s door, knocked, and then bounded back into the forest. He turned to watch from behind a tree.

The boy’s angry brother with the red-blue-green cloak opened the door, picked up the bag of mushrooms, and looked around. He shrugged, then turned and yelled into the house, “There’s a bag of mushrooms at our door!”

“Are they poisonous?” asked the voice of the older brother, the wizard. “Let me look.” He came into the light of the door, pulled aside a corner of the cloth, and touched a mushroom-cap. “No, they’re good to eat.”

“Who left them?” asked the boy from inside. “Was it Cousin Eduard?”

“He’s too far away,” scoffed the angry one.

“And he would have come inside, with more mushrooms,” said the wizard-brother.

“Then we must have a friend who doesn’t want to be seen,” said the boy, and Berwald ducked his head further behind a bush. He stared cross-eyed at a bug crawling on the ground toward his nose, and hoped his blond head-fur didn’t show too much.

 

 

The next day the boy went fishing, and Berwald watched and tried to learn what he did. He took a worm and put it on a piece of string tied to a stick, and would wait with the string dangling in the water until a fish bit, whereupon he pulled it out of the river. Far upstream, Berwald tried this using a worm, a tall piece of grass, and a reed, but the fish ate the worm and swam away.

He ate the rest of the patch of mushrooms for dinner, with a handful of berries.

 

 

The next day the boy went outside to pick berries but there weren’t as many on the bushes at the house, and boy seemed unhappy, so Berwald gathered up another piece of cloth from his little warm nest in the corner of his den and gathered berries in the forest for him.

He left it at the door again, knocked to get their attention, and ran to hide in the forest and watch.

The boldest brother opened the door again, picked up the bag, and shouted, “Someone left us berries from the forest!”

“Are they safe to eat?” asked the wizard, coming to the door. He glanced at them, then back inside the house. “They are.”

“And I thought I wouldn’t have enough to make berry pie!” said the boy, coming into the doorway and taking the bundle from his brothers. “I’m so glad. I wish I could thank whoever’s leaving us these gifts!”

“Leaving you these gifts, more like,” said the bold one.

“At least they’re friendly, whoever they are,” said the wizard.

“I wonder if they’re still here,” said the boy, peering into the darkness. Berwald tried to hold still, knowing that if he moved the boy would see him.

 

 

 

The next morning there was a delicious smell coming from the house, and when Berwald looked in the window he saw a pie sitting on the sill. He could smell the berries in it.

There was a slice cut out, left on a plate next to the whole pie, with a note beside it written in big letters: FOR OUR MYSTERIOUS FRIEND.

Berwald watched the house and waited for it to be empty so he could sneak close and take the pie. He knew it would taste delicious because it smelled so good, and because the boy had made it himself with his own hands.

But the house never emptied. The wizard went to hunt birds and the bold one went to hunt deer, but the boy stayed in the house and baked loaves of bread and cooked fish – how delicious it smelled! – and some turnips from the garden.

Berwald waited and waited, growing hungrier and hungrier, until finally he fell asleep there at the edge of the forest.

 

 

 

When he woke up the boy and his brothers were eating dinner, and the pie was gone from the sill but the single piece was still there, waiting.

The brothers were talking, inside the house, and Berwald could hear them through the window.

“I see we didn’t receive any gifts today,” said the wizard.

“Looks like your friend is gone!” crowed the bold one.

“He’s just shy!” said the boy. “You scared him off!”

But Berwald wasn’t scared of the bold one. Hurt, he looked around for something to prove it, and finally found a lone little flax-flower, escaped from the brothers’ garden, and picked it, kissing each of the petals, and snuck to the door. He put it in front of the door and knocked, then ran away and hid in the bushes again.

Inside the cabin, the brothers had gone silent, and then the wizard said gently, “I think the door is for you.”

There were footsteps, and then the boy opened the door all alone and picked up the flower, then stepped outside and closed the door.

“Are you there?” he called out. “You can come out. You’re the one who’s been watching me fish, aren’t you?”

Berwald trembled a little, that he’d been seen, and hunkered down in the bushes, but his eyes and his nose tried to drip and he sniffled just a bit and the boy started walking towards his hiding place and –

“I saw your fishing pole. Would you like my old one? You’re one of the wolf-boys, aren’t you. I bet you like fish. There’s extra inside. Would you like some?”

Berwald, still curled on the ground, looked up and up at the boy, who was looking at him.

“Please,” he said. The boy was still holding the flax-flower.

The boy held out one hand and said, “Would you like to come inside?”

Berwald shivered, thinking of all those humans inside a room, and shook his head.

The boy’s face fell, but he said, “Then I’ll bring you the fish. Do you want some of the pie?”

Berwald nodded, and so did the boy, who walked back into the house. There was the clatter-chime of plates, and then the boy came back outside, holding two plates – one with a fish, and one with the slice of berry pie. He walked to where Berwald was hiding and sat down on the ground, and put the plates in front of Berwald.

“My name is Tino,” the boy said, “and if you’d like I can teach you how to fish tomorrow.”


End file.
